Fresh bedsheets and dusk walks: Expert tips for sleep-deprived freshers - BBC

University sleep expert and psychotherapist Jo Baker advises freshers that quality sleep starts with how you wake up, urging students to get outside for daylight before roughly 11am to trigger a light-sensitive part of the brain that regulates the body clock.
Anna-May Dixon, 20, who commutes four hours round-trip from Kendal, Cumbria to study dance at the University of Salford, gets about five hours' sleep a night with a 5am alarm and finds tasks harder as the week goes on.
Baker warns against forcing an early night, saying lying awake teaches the brain to associate bed with stress; instead, a consistent waking time is the most important habit.
Caffeine from coffee and fizzy drinks lingers in the body and blocks the natural build-up of sleepiness, so overdoing it can create a genuine sleep problem.
Alcohol undermines rest too, according to Baker, effectively anaesthetising rather than helping sleep and replacing restorative deep sleep with lighter, less restful sleep.
Emma Young, deputy director of student services for health and wellbeing at Manchester Metropolitan University, highlights alcohol-free options during freshers' week, including "sip and paint" events, yoga, crafts and other wellbeing clubs for students who prefer alternatives to sport or music societies.